Tentacle-Free Anime: "Miss Hokusai" (2015) Review

King of Thorn wasn't exactly the anime I wanted to return with after a month off and 100 reviews. Miss Hokusai was actually the film I wanted to talk about, however things happened and I just wasn't able to get a proper discussion procured in time for the deadline. That being said, I wasn't going to pass it up again. So let's travel back to 1814 near the end of the Edo period, the tail end of the age of the samurai...

Summary: It's 1814 and the city of Edo is one of the most populated homes of peasants, samurai, townsmen, merchants, nobles, artists, courtesans, and maybe even supernatural beings. Two residents are the highly accomplished artist Tetsuzo and his talented 23-year-old daughter O-Ei. Tetsuo gains worldwide acclaim as Katsushika Hokusai, but few would know "Miss Hokusai," the daughter who assisted him uncredited. [AnimeNewsNetwork.com]

Miss Hokusai is an art piece about life. It's not an epic and it's not an adventure, however it's an emotional journey filled with symbolism and heart. Don't go in expecting to be blown away, but to be taken away. This is a film to pay attention to.

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My experience with this film was pretty wonderful. I got to watch it with a small group of my close friends in the theater space of our city's Museum of Art. A place where films like this can thrive as art pieces and not just pieces of entertainment. And that's rightfully what Miss Hokusai should be considered – an art piece. The story focuses on the tale of O-Ei, eldest daughter to Hokusai, who's considered to be one of the greatest painters of all time.

His piece “The Great Wave off Kanagawa” is still featured as a highly acclaimed piece all around the world. Now, I can't sit here and say I'm a historian, so I can't tell you how accurate the story of the film is, however I can take it at face value and tell you about what I saw and what I took away from it.

There's a precise subdued feeling to the entire movie as it moves by slowly and fills its screentime with mostly slow, mellow moments that show just how boring life can seem while being subtly surrounded with mesmerizing events. O-Ei herself is a very reserved character, a trait she gets from her father. Neither of them take anything too seriously in this film except for their painting. O-Ei is trying to be as good as Hokusai and break out of his shadow.

Sadly that never happens, but that's simply how life works. This doesn't make her any less compelling. She's a hard worker, she cracks the rare joke with her dry sense of humor, we get glimpses into her womanhood as she attempts to win the affections of a man at one point – while also completely missing the wooing being wrought on by another male character during the story – and she deeply loves her family. Supporting her father, consistently visiting her mother who lives in a separate home, and taking care of her sister who lives with caretakers due to her blindness.​

There is no rest for the wicked and the hardworking

Family is a huge part of this film and we see the foundations of these people slowly break down over time. And like life, their bonds aren't completely broken by their failures to take care of one another, but it's these failures that make them all the more interesting to root for. Hokusai is incredibly passionate about painting and making sure his eldest daughter becomes the best she can be. That being said, he has also shunned his wife by leaving her to be a traveling painter, and he's shunned his youngest daughter for fear that her lack of vision will make him weak.

The youngest daughter, by the way, is one of the strongest people in this film. You genuinely get a feel for her struggles and how much effort she puts into carrying on by choosing to remain happy and hopeful and take in as much of the world around her as she possibly can.

Leaving the main family for a second, there really is a wide array of characters in this film. Again, no one in this film is unlikable. They're just existing and some of them will make mistakes, but then redeem themselves later. There's another character who's also a disciple of Hokusai living with him and O-Ei. He's a fun character with his own unique painting style who later befriends a dog and seeing those two grow together throughout the story is wonderful.

The film also has a lot of cool and strange moments in it as well. I use strange as a compliment, though, because this movie and its portrayal of certain events are my kind of aesthetic. Hokusai and O-Ei believe in the supernatural and there are several occasions throughout the film that the director and animators choose to tell these characters gaining their inspirations for certain paintings through literal portrayals of those paintings. Like a dragon coming out of the sky or a possibly demonic spirit protruding from a woman's face.​

O-Ei learns from the best

​The two react in a way as if they can see these phenomenon's, and perhaps they can, but the truth is intentionally left ambiguous so that the viewer can take away what they want out of it. For me personally I saw the yokai-like events as more symbolic of how these people felt at the time rather than what was legitimately happening. Regardless, it adds another layer to an already packed film and still manages to make them work.

Some of the cooler moments come from how the filmmakers choose incorporate some of Hokusai's most famous paintings into the narrative. There's one scene where O-Ei and her younger sister are on a gondola ride and the waves of the river begin to get rougher and rougher to the point where they rise up over the gondola and freeze-frame to mimic the Great Waves off Kanagawa. It's cheesy for sure, but just the kind of cheese I like.

Miss Hokusai isn't without its detracting elements, however. The music choices for instance is a strange addition and I mean that definitely in the more confusing of ways. The film begins and ends on a rock anthem that feels very out of place for the Edo time period, as well as the rest of the film which, in between these two tracks, utilizes orchestral tones that fit better with what we're watching. Also, the ending does leave a lot to be desired.

Given that this is meant to be based somewhat on reality, it ends on one of those notes that films of this nature often do, by giving us a non-ending that leaves the characters lives up from a certain point open to interpretation, and then derails that slightly by telling us through textual narrative what exactly happened to them after the movie ends. Apparently O-Ei eventually went into isolation as a much older woman and it is unknown when she actually died. Huh.​

The sisters meet the great wave

There's also this quite strange moment at the very end where O-Ei walks off into the crowd, the camera zooms out to showcase the village as it is during that time period with all of its people and then drastically switches to a frame showing what that are looks like in modern Tokyo today with real footage. It really jerks you out of the movie right at the tail end and I did not enjoy it. In a film already filled with odd, but not totally unwarranted or unwanted, choices it does seem to me that this is the oddest of them all. And not one I'm totally down with just because of how truly out of place it is.

This is not a film that will leave you feeling pumped or excited, but more so pondering on what an experience can be. It doesn't have to be a big, bombastic summer blockbuster with tons of action. In some cases it really can just be a small character piece that truly and honestly focuses on the life of these people. For all intents and purposes, Miss Hokusai is a true to nature slice-of-life story.

Finally, I really haven't touched on it yet, but the animation is gorgeous. So much detail was put into this movie to make it look as good as it can and make the world these characters inhabit lively and vibrant. Other than the sudden live-action shot of modern day Tokyo at the end, the rest of this film is simply stunning and if I continue to talk about I'm just going to be caught up in saying the same damn thing. You'll see in the images just how good this movie looks.

Miss Hokusai is the latest North American release from GKids who specialize in distributing animated films from all around the world. I hope to tackle more of their titles in the near future, but this one is definitely a good place to start. I highly recommend you go watch this film.

Final Score: 4 Famous Hokusai Paintings out of 5

Have you checked out Miss Hokusai yet or did you completely miss it? Let us know in the comments!